Video: Upsampling versus "real" pixels

All right gang, we've chosen the image Size command, we've turned on Resample image, we've set the Interpolation of Bicubic and we've set the Resolution value to 600 pixels per inch, thereby ensuring that we will increase the size of the image to 36 times its former size. So now what I'm going to do is click the OK button in order to scale that image and now we are seeing the new pixels at the 100% zoom ratio, but I'm not sure where we are inside the image, so I'm going to press and hold the H key in order to take advantage of that bird's eye function.

Photoshop is the world’s most powerful image editor, and it’s arguably the most complex, as well. Fortunately, nobody knows the program like award-winning book and video author Deke McClelland. Join Deke as he explores such indispensable Photoshop features as resolution, cropping, color correction, retouching, and layers. Gain expertise with real-world projects that make sense. Exercise files accompany the course.

Upsampling versus "real" pixels

All right gang, we've chosen the image Size command, we've turned on Resampleimage, we've set the Interpolation of Bicubic and we've set the Resolution valueto 600 pixels per inch, thereby ensuring that we will increase the size of theimage to 36 times its former size.So now what I'm going to do is click the OK button in order to scale that imageand now we are seeing the new pixels at the 100% zoom ratio, but I'm not surewhere we are inside the image, so I'm going to press and hold the H key in orderto take advantage of that bird's eye function.

So with H pressed clicking and holding and then dragging up here to theskeleton of the shepherd.And you know what, I'm going to go ahead and zoom in by pressing Ctrl+Plus orCommand+Plus on the Mac, so that we can view this guy in more detail and I'malso going to press Shift+Tab to hide my right-side panels, and this is the newdetail inside the image, now just to give you a sense of how far we've come,this is what the image look like if we just zoomed it to 1200%, and you can seethe zoom level up here in the Application Bar.

As opposed of course to the new detail, that was generated by Upsampling theimage using the Image Size command, and we're seeing the image now at 200%.So I think fairly obviously, the resampled image is in somewhat better shapethan the zoomed only image, and we won't see the Pixel Grid, right, if we hadzoomed it using nearest neighbor or something that didn't really take advantageof Interpolation, then we would see the image more like this.So I just press Ctrl+H or Command+H to hide the Pixel Grid for a moment.

So this is a better depiction of the image, and this of course is the Upsampled version.Now the Upsampled version does give us a little better line definition Isuppose, I mean we can tell a little better that the stripes are teeth insidethe skeleton's head as opposed to this view where it's a little ambiguous whatwe're looking at quite frankly.Also bear in mind that this image is about 2 megabytes inside of Photoshop andyou are just going to zip through it with your edits, whereas this image is like64 megabytes, 65, something along those lines, so much, much bigger.

And it's going to take Photoshop a little more effort to work its way through,and it's going to take longer to print, and in return you're not really gettingthat much better detail.So my point is this, Photoshop though it tries very hard to generate new detailwhen you are Upsampling an image, is not very good at it, because it doesn'tknow what that original detail was.It's giving you sort of gummier, murkier transitions than you have with straightpixels, however, that's not really the same as actual real detail.

What's the solution?If this isn't the solution, what is?The solution, my friends, is this image right here and it goes by the nameShepherd and big flock.tif, and what this is is an image that I scanned at ahigher resolution in the first place.So I'm going to do ahead and press Ctrl+ 1 or Command+1 on the Mac, in order tozoom into this image at 100%.I'm going to press and hold the H key once again, and click and hold, and dragmy View up to the skeleton, just like so.

Scroll them over a little bit, and now, you can see what the skeleton reallylook like, these are the actual lines.In fact, you might argue, we have a little bit too much information, becausewe have all this glorious, wonderful paper texture, which I think looksabsolutely fantastic.And some of the lines are amazingly smooth, like these lines around theshoulder blade, this line through the skeleton's mouth, some of the lines in the hat and so on.So compare that my friends to the Upsampled version here, and it's nocomparison whatsoever.

The real thing, the real pixels, are what you want.You want to capture as many pixels as possible.So what does that mean?If you're scanning -- if you're shooting with a Digital Camera always shoot atyour top resolution, do not buy-in to the notion that you should shoot at alower resolution because you can pack more images onto your card.That is a bunch of malarkey from a Photoshop perspective.Because we don't care how many images you can pack on your card you canalways get more cards, if you need to, what we care about is the quality ofthe image inside of Photoshop, and if you capture as many pixels as possible,you have more room to crop.

You have more room to re-size.You have more room to edit the image, more pixels are always going to lead to more clarity.Now what about scanning, what resolution should you scan at?Well, you should look at your Scanner's documentation and you should find outwhat the top Optical Resolution is.You don't care about the very top resolution.You care about the top Optical Resolution and you should scan at thatresolution on a regular basis.Now I'll admit something here, my top Optical Resolution with this Scanner was1200 pixels per inch, and I went ahead and scanned this image at 600 pixels perinch, which worked out just fine for Pencil Art like this.

But if later, I think I should, wish I had scanned it at a higher resolution,I'm out of luck, unless I want to go back and scan it at a higher resolution.So when in doubt, regardless of the device, capture as many pixels as you can.

Q: While following along to the tutorial, my copy of Bridge does not have the same Export options as shown in the video. Why are these options missing in my copy?

A: For some reason, Bridge CS5 shipped without the Export options. They were included when Bridge updated to version 4.0.1. Updating Bridge will restore the export options.

Q: While following along with the exercises, next to the background layer on my Layers panel \, it shows a brush instead of the small picture, as it does in the video. What can I do to fix this? I erased the exercise files and started over, but it still shows the paintbrush.

A: This will occur if the Layers panel preview is turned off. To fix this, right-click in the empty gray area below the Background layer. Then choose Large Thumbnails. The thumbnail previews should come back immediately.

Q: The instructions for installing the dekeKeys don't work on my computer (which is running Mac OS X Lion). Is there an update to these?

A: The dekeKeys distributed with this course will still work for Lion. You just need to add them to a slightly different folder than in previous versions of OS X.

Open a new Finder window and choose Go > Go to Folder. Type the following file path exactly as written below. Copying and pasting may result in an error.

Learn by watching, listening, and doing, Exercise files are the same files the author uses in the course, so you can download them and follow along Premium memberships include access to all exercise files in the library.

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Learn by watching, listening, and doing! Exercise files are the same files the author uses in the course, so you can download them and follow along. Exercise files are available with all Premium memberships.
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